It’s coming up on evening as I write this, and we still haven’t reached our high of the day – anywhere from 5-7C/41-45F depending on which app I look at.
When I headed out to do the morning cat feeding, I didn’t even bother wearing a coat.
One of things we find in the winter is tunnels dug into the piled up snow. Today, I found two new ones – and evidence to show what has been making them!
The first photo is of the biggest tunnel. It’s hard to see, but to the left of the opening there is the distinctive paw print of a raccoon. Both raccoons and skunks are out now, and I’m seeing them in the sun room, stealing kibble!
The next three photos are of one tunnel with two openings.
I wonder if they nap in them or something?
After doing my morning routine, I was basically knackered. I am feeling both better and worse today. Better in some ways, but worse in a new pain way. I can’t stand for very long. It’s better while I’m moving, for a little while, at least.
So the girls have been taking over for me for the most part. I did go out again to do the evening cat feeding, and even tried to clear more snow away from around the well cap, were the bigger of those snow tunnels was.
This gorgeous tuxedo is a very feral male. He’ll go into the sun room sometimes to eat, or to assert dominance over other males, but will not allow a human to come anywhere near him. Which is the only reason he didn’t run away as soon as I walked back into the sun room. He and Hypotenose where having words.
It was so nice out, I found excuses to stay outside longer. Did a bit more clearing of snow from around the well cap, though I probably shouldn’t have. I hate not being able to do work while the conditions are good.
The fluffy tabby glaring at me on the right is Furriosa. She has been making strange a lot more often of late. Which is unfortunate, as we want her to get used to being handled as much as possible before we take her in to the city for vetting and fostering and eventual adoption. When the time comes, I think we’ll have to close up the isolation shelter with the littles inside for the night, to make it easier to get them into carriers the next day. Sir Robin and Grommet will be easy to get, as will Domino and Blot. Bug has even been more ansty lately, and when I try to pet Furriosa in the isolation shelter, she runs out now. I think the warmer weather has something to do with it. They have more energy to run around!
Tomorrow is Easter, and it’s going to be a quiet one at home. I’m not up to driving to my mother’s to visit her and deliver a basket, as I’d planned, but I will be phoning her instead. All the remaining Easter preparations will be on the girls. Monday is our 38th anniversary, but we won’t be doing anything special this year. Tuesday, I bring the truck in to get checked out to find out why I’m losing oil again. Hopefully, the truck will not have anything major going on, and I will be feeling well enough to make the trip to my mothers – and the city trip to deliver cats! – later in the week.
Right now, I’m torn between wanting to go back outside and enjoying the day, or crawling into bed and curling up into a ball until tomorrow.
The plow went by last night, so I made sure to head out and clear the plow ridge before heading into town for my dental appointment.
I’m so antsy and paranoid about the truck, I ended up leaving half an hour earlier than intended – and I was already planning to leave half an hour earlier than I needed to, to get to my appointment!
It did give me time to stop for the mail and then get a bit of gas beforehand.
Of course, every time I stopped and started again, I was on edge, waiting for something to break down again.
The road to town was surprisingly bad. A lot of areas covered by blowing snow yesterday had become hard packed, icy – and melting! It may have been only about -8C/18F and windy at the time, but any dark surface was warming up in the sun quite a bit!
Once at the clinic, I started looking in my emails for our new insurance information. My husband’s employer had an excellent insurance package that still applies as long as he’s on long term disability (which ends at age 65) that included me and the girls, until they reached the age of 19. For most prescriptions and dental, we got 90% coverage.
The company has since changed their insurance package. After much back and forth-ing, we found that if he wanted to maintain the same level of coverage for both of us, we’d have to basically pay $300 a month – on top of the 10% that isn’t covered – billed quarterly. (His employer would still pay 100% of the premium for basic coverage.) Which is wildly out of budget for us. Even if it just covered him, we would have had to pay more than our budget has room for to get the same coverage he’s getting right now.
We ended up taking the only other option that would include me on the insurance. We’ll now be covered 75% instead of 90%, and to include me works out to just under $30 a month.
They will also no longer be issuing membership cards. It’s all going to be through an app.
That kicks in on April 1st.
I had hoped to be able to give the dental clinic the new insurance information, but there was nothing in any of the emails. Not even where to download the app. We’ll be needing to give this information to our pharmacy, too.
I got nothing.
I did let them know that the insurance would be changing soon, but it would not affect today’s visit.
Then I settled in for what I expected to be a long wait.
They took me in early!
While the tech was setting me up, I explained about the broken tooth, and how I’ve had no pain in my lower jaw that they’d been trying to find the source of the last two times I was there, since the piece fell out. She told me she’d heard of how pain can sometimes be in a completely different area before, but never to the extent it did with me! She got an Xray, which was awkward because of how far back the tooth is, but she got enough of an image that the dentist could use it.
When he came in, he joked about how my broken tooth “cured” the pain I was having before! He had tried so many things to find the source of the pain, where I was feeling it! I told him, my mouth was feeling better than it had in ages – except for the sharp bits cutting my cheek and tongue.
He took a look and said that, ultimately, I would need a crown. Which is what I expected. They couldn’t do that today, though. I explained about the insurance change and he considered it, but there was no way they’d be able to get a crown booked in before the end of March. For now, though, he could put in a “temporary” filling.
The entire procedure went very well! The freezing has worn off, so I just have that “healing itch” right now, but that’s it. It is so great to not have those sharp edges!
When it was done, I asked how long I could expect this “temporary” filling to last, and he basically said, years. It’s more an issue of having new pieces of tooth breaking off than the filling itself. Unless something like that happens, or I start to feel pain, I can hold off getting the crown for quite some time.
Well, that was good news!
I felt good enough, and the truck ran well enough, that I decided I was up to visiting my mother. I just wanted to stop at the nearby pharmacy to pick up some Voltaren that she asked me for.
Which is when I started feeling some thumping and thudding at the wheels, as I turned into the parking lot.
Nothing at all like what was happening before, though. Particularly not that big kathump. I pulled into a spot as quickly as I could…
… and found a big chunk of ice had fallen off from under the truck!
The roads may have been melting, but it’s cold enough that any water froze pretty much immediately. My mud flaps were not only full of ice built up to the point of rubbing on the tire, but there were horizontal icicles formed at the bottom edges!
I knocked off as much as I could, though one flap’s build up was so large and solid, I could barely chip away parts of it with the scraper end of my snow brush.
Once I got it clear enough, I finished parking properly!
After I was done at the pharmacy, I headed to my mother’s town, cutting across to a different highway to head south until I reached the road that led straight to my mother’s town on yet a third highway.
I forgot just how bad the highway I took is. It’s not broken up or anything, but it’s a very rough ride. Today, it was also pretty badly covered with ice and packed snow, with melting edges. Which did not help with my paranoia of something breaking down on the truck again!
The cross road to my mother’s town was even worse, when it came to the ice and snow.
The noises didn’t start again until I was turning into the parking lot at the hospital. Just a rubbing noise, mostly.
After parking, I went to look, and just had to take a couple of pictures.
All the wheel wells had big teeth! So many teeth!!!
I spent the next while knocking off ice as much as I could, but there was still that one flap that was too solid and wouldn’t come off. I did park the truck with that side facing the sun, though, so I left it and just hoped the dark surface of the mud flap would warm up enough to start it melting a bit.
Then I headed in to visit with my mother.
It was a pretty good visit. She was happy to see me, though she did immediately start complaining. That included calling her radio – the high end one my brother got her years ago that worked just fine in her apartment, but can’t pick up the stations she wants from inside the hospital – garbage. Another radio had been brought in that was labeled as available for all to use, and she says it works fine, but her radio doesn’t.
Except it does. It just can’t pick up the Polish language station she’d been listening to, back at her old apartment with a special antenna set up.
Then there was the phone. It’s garbage. It’s not working. She can’t use it.
I told her, it’s not garbage. It works fine. It seems she’s been trying to make calls and hasn’t been able to figure it out, but forgets that part of the reason we got it for her is so that we could phone her directly, rather than through the nursing station.
I ended up spending some time with her phone. We’ve given up trying to show her how to use the contacts list, and have told her to just dial a number and press the green button, like she did with her previous phone.
I caught two potential problems.
One is, the phone goes to sleep after a while. Any button can be pushed to wake it up, but if you start to dial without waking it up first, it doesn’t register that first number at all. So we walked through that a bit, and I got her to call my cell phone a few times.
Which is when I discovered she hasn’t been putting the phone to her ear. She has just been staring at the screen with the “connecting…” display.
So I walked her through it a few times, including telling her to actually put the phone to her ear after hitting the green button.
Then she wanted to phone my sister, because it’s Friday, which is a day off for her.
I helped her make the call, though her contacts list, and had to tell her to put the phone to her ear again.
When my sister answered, my mother promptly started basically arguing with her about not visiting. It turns out she expects my sister to come out on both Wednesdays and Fridays. Not Saturday, because they celebrate their church’s version of the Sabbath. I could hear my sister explaining that she’s not going to be able to come out every Friday because that’s her day to get ready for the Sabbath. When my mother brought up that she hadn’t come out on Wednesday, I heard her saying that she had tried to call my mother, several times, but got no answer.
…
My mother seemed a bit confused by that. Then starting saying things about not knowing how to use the phone, and maybe she didn’t have it with her…
She got another reminder to keep the phone with her whenever she leaves her room.
Her call with my sister went on long enough that her supper pills were delivered, and it was getting to the point where I needed to head home. After a while, I had to remind my mother that she needed to take her pills, so they finished the call. I helped her take her pills (the nurse brought the pills, but my mother didn’t have any water to take them with) and we talked for a bit longer before her supper tray was brought to her. So that’s when I said my good byes and headed out.
Checking on the truck, first!
Yes, it was long enough and sunny enough that I was finally able to get that huge chunk of ice off the last mud flap!
I messaged home before I left, letting the family know I was going straight home and requesting some food be ready for me, since I hadn’t had lunch. My mouth was thawed out enough that I could safely eat and not worry about accidentally chewing a hole in a numb cheek (I’ve actually done that in the past!).
The last stretch of highway wasn’t much better, but at least it wasn’t as wet. When I got home, I didn’t have as many new teeth hanging down from my fenders!
After checking and clearing around the wheel wells, though, I spotted a surprise under the front end.
A perfect looking – but very dead – butterfly had fallen out from somewhere under the front end! It looked ready to fly away at any moment!
So very odd.
With how well the truck handled, I think it would be safe to try for our first stock up shop for April, tomorrow. Not a Costco run though. The one essential stop I need to make is a Canadian Tire, as we just ran out of litter pellets, so Costco will wait until next week. This time, we’ll be picking up stuff for our Easter basket, and I want to make a small one for my mother, too.
I’m only slightly more confident about driving the truck to the city.
If it hadn’t been so weird about sometimes working fine – usually when the mechanics were taking it for a test drive – to suddenly needing to be towed again, with so many different things seeming to go wrong all at once, I wouldn’t be this paranoid about it.
It is what it is, though. We play the hand we’re dealt with, and do the best we can!
For now, though, I can honestly say it was a really good day.
The plan for the day was to give the truck a test by heading into town this morning, then if all went well, to visit my mother in the afternoon.
Well, one out of three got done.
This morning, after taking care of the outside cats, I did a bit of shoveling around the house and the truck, which is parked in the yard until my brother can move his truck out of the garage into a spot I’m not even going to try and get it into, with all the snow. The snow in the yard wasn’t too bad, though.
Then I decided to check the end of the driveway.
It was drifted over.
The road didn’t need to be plowed, but there was enough snow drifted across between the gate and the road that it had to be cleared before I could go anywhere.
So did the rest of the driveway.
I could have gotten through, I’m sure, but 1) I didn’t want to push the truck when I’m not even convinced the replaced differential was the cause of all the problems I was having, 2) I would have been slip sliding the whole way and 3) our forecasts are no longer showing temperatures above freezing coming up in the 10 day forecast, but they are showing more snow before then.
I did the end of the driveway, first. The snow was still light and fluffy, so it was an easy job. It still took almost an hour. I stopped after that to head in, have breakfast, hydrate and take some painkillers.
Before coming in, though, I checked on little Spewie.
The auger still won’t turn. Which means it wasn’t just something frozen in the works somewhere. It’s actually broken. Nothing is visibly broken, though. I’d have to dismantle it to find the problem.
Not going to happen any time soon.
It did mean the driveway had to be done the old fashioned way.
I didn’t even do all of it. I did part of the turning radius to get into the garage when coming in from the road, but not where I would be turning in from the inner yard. I did clear around my brother’s truck, though.
Then I had to head in and take a rest brake. I really, really didn’t want to go anywhere, but I wanted to test the truck again before my dental appointment, tomorrow, and refill a couple of our water bottles in the process. I am also not counting on being able to get into the city on Saturday, and had some stuff I wanted to get, just in case, while at the grocery store. Things just keep happening and changing my plans!
I had just finished with the shoveling, gotten inside and was starting to take my coat off when the phone rang. I didn’t even try go get to it before the answering machine picked up.
It was the pharmacy delivery driver, letting us know he was almost at our place.
So I put my coat back on and headed out to meet him at the gate.
Oh, gosh. I just realized, as I write this. It’s still open.
*sigh*
After taking a break – and more painkillers – I grabbed the water jugs and headed out.
Happily, I did not get stuck getting out of the yard.
As for the drive in, the truck seemed to be working fine, but the road is in such bad shape, plus it now has the remains of drifts and ice along the way, that it was really hard to judge what I was feeling. Was that the truck shuddering, or was it the road making it shudder?
Along the way, I saw three back hoes, busily clearing the ditches of snow – two of them in our own municipality, including one right in our little hamlet. They’ve gotten a lot of progress in the past couple of days. It’s going to make a big difference, once the snow finally starts to melt.
I got a few things “extra” to take advantage of some sales, along with refilling the water jugs. Blocks of cheese were on sale, so I ended up getting four different kinds. I was able to get a decent amount of meat this time, including stewing beef. Rye bread, as always, plus some Naan that was on sale. Stuff like that.
I saw some 7.5kg kibble on sale and got a bag for the outside cats, just in case. In the end, even with the sale prices, it came out to $200, but I used some of my points and got $30 off.
By the time I was done, I knew there was no way I was going to visit my mother. I was in just too much pain. Instead, I headed straight home, without even stopping for more gas ($1.729/L still) or the post office. I can do that tomorrow, when I go in for my dental appointment.
I’ll call my mother later on, instead.
Once I got home, I drove up to the house and my daughter helped me unload everything but the kibble. I took that through the sun room and added it to the bin right away, then did the evening cat feeding, so no one would have to go out again, later.
I was supposed to close the gate again before going back in. I’m thinking it should be safe to leave open for the night. Our vandal doesn’t seem to do as much stupid stuff in the winter.
*sigh*
I think today is a good day to go to bed early – after I call my mother.
And take more pain killers.
*sigh*
It’s a good thing I actually enjoy shoveling so much.
It’s supposed to continue from how to about 2am. The forecast of just a couple of inches in total over the span of three days is now 7.75cm/3in just for tonight.
I am so tired of winter.
Watch, we’ll get our April blizzard this year, too…
Misty using Ghosty as a pillow, who is using Cheddar as a pillow.
There were actually 6 cats mashed together in this particular cuddle puddle.
So… update on the truck.
I got a call back from the garage. He had called the parts supplier and was assured the replacement differential will arrive at their city location today (Friday).
Which means it will get to the local location and the truck will be repaired on Monday.
There’s nothing they can do until they have the part. It is what it is. However, it means no vehicle for another weekend.
I asked about the possibility of a courtesy vehicle and he was very apologetic. They simply don’t have anything available.
Fair enough.
We do have my brother’s truck, but I really don’t dare drive it any further than I already have. Particularly right now. We’re under a fog advisory at the moment – visibility down to zero in places. Temperatures are supposed to stay above freezing all through to tomorrow and, with it, we’ll be getting a mix of rain and snow. Road conditions are going to be very dangerous. I simply don’t trust myself to drive a much larger, strange vehicle in the conditions we are expecting. I don’t want to risk wrecking my brother’s truck, just because I’m not used to driving a beast. If it were summer, it would be a different story. I still wouldn’t want to do it, but at least the chances of my ending up in the ditch or something would be far lower!
The only problem is, I wasn’t able to get a lot of kibble at the general store, yesterday. We’ll have to make what we have, stretch through the weekend. We might be able to do our outside cat version of cat soup, which would help and they love. It might be warm enough that it won’t freeze before they eat it.
These issues with the truck are getting ridiculous. It’s getting closer to two months now, where the truck has been in the garage with only a few days here and there when we were able to bring it home before something else went wrong!
We’ll figure it out.
Oh, and…
Happy first day of Spring.
Imaged created by WordPress AI – but that’s pretty much what it feels like outside right now.
When I checked the temps in the wee hours, we were at 7C/46F, but it felt like 4C/39F. As I write this, we are now at 10C/50F, but it feels like 3C/37F! The expected high of the day is only 16C/61F.
I don’t know if we got one last rainfall during the night. Wind is the real issue this morning. For the first time in a long time, though, I have not been seeing smoke, so I’m hoping all that rain has made a big difference for the wildfires.
While doing my morning rounds, I finally gave in and took the netting off from above the Arikara squash. The elm seeds are mostly dropped, and it was doing nothing to keep the cats off. In fact, as I was starting to pull the ground staples to remove it, one of the yard cats (a tabby with no name) jumped onto the mesh and immediately fell through over a squash and started to roll around in a panic!
Thankfully, the collars around the squash did their jobs, and nothing was crushed.
What we do have, however, is buds and even a blooming flower!
What is strange is that these are all female flowers. No male flowers! I’m used to the male flowers blooming first. I’m not sure if I should be pruning these off so the plants themselves can grow bigger before starting to bloom again. I’ve never grown these before. I’ll have to look that up. I’d hate to have to prune them but, without any male flowers to pollinate them, the baby squash are just going to wither away, anyhow.
At the high raised bed, I decided to pick these, as the plants were getting big enough to crowd other things out.
I’m leaving one Purple Prince (I think) plant that has bolted to go to seed. Tiny flower buds have started to appear. I picked the other larger ones; perhaps I waited too long and should have picked them at a smaller stage. As for the red thing in the middle, I thought it was a beat, but as I was cleaning and trimming it later, I could see that it’s white on the insides to… a big radish?
That’s one thing about using a seed mix for the winter sowing. This one was a mix of whatever root vegetable seeds I had left. There was only one type of turnip, which makes it easy, but there were several times of radishes and beets, and two types of carrots. One type of radish – the French Breakfast – has a distinct shape that makes it easy to identify. Everything else is “root vegetable surprise”. 😄
I just hope today isn’t so cold that the seeds recently planted will die off and rot instead of germinating. Things are supposed to get sunny and warm up over the next while, without extreme heat, which will be nice. Those overnight temperatures, when they start dropping below 10C/50F, could be a problem, though. The transplants should handle things fine, but the direct sowing… well, we’ll see how those go. At the very least, it will slow germination down.
Well, hopefully, we will have a long, moderate fall and a late first frost, to extend our growing season.
Meanwhile, in the time it took me to write this, our temperature has actually dropped, instead of getting warmer! We’re not supposed to reach our high of the day until 7 or 8 this evening. I’m( seriously considered plugging the cat house in again. It’s overcast enough that the light sensor for the heat bulb will turn on for the kittens.
This morning, I stayed in my pjs, popped on some rubber boots and did my short rounds. Which is just as well. It was snaining – snow-raining – at the time. You could even hear a continuous almost crackling noise as frozen rain hit. In fact, you can hear it in the video I took this morning.
It was -1C/30F, with a wind chill of -4C/25F at the time. The thermometer in the portable greenhouse was reading 1C/34F. Not a lot of difference.
The holes in the roof probably didn’t help.
Yup, I found a couple of tears in the plastic this morning. Best guess is, a cat tried to jump onto it from the kibble house roof.
Thankfully, there was no other damage. For now, I used clear duct tape to close them up from the inside. Once everything is warm and dry again, I’ll at more to the outside.
I had a lot of hungry cats this morning, including Brussel, but she was nursing her babies and wouldn’t leave the cat cave. She waited for me to deliver her wet cat food breakfast, instead. I’m glad of that, as it is more assurance that she and her kittens won’t simply disappear one morning, to some hidden location.
Last of all, I gave her a squeeze treat. It was harder than usual, as there were other cats around, and they can smell it. They want some, too, but we don’t have enough for all the cats. They’re just for the mama.
Once again, as I moved the tube away so I could squeeze the rest out, she got angry at me. She did wait, though, as I squeezed the last of it onto my finger and put my hand in. There was no hesitation as she licked the last of it off – but when I pulled my hand away, she attacked it, trying to pull it back!
Sorry, Mama. You ate it all up!
Once I was back inside, I headed to bed pretty much right away. This time, the cats let me sleep – as did the pain killers. Somewhat. I got at least a couple of hours of sleep out of it.
Meanwhile, my daughters got the drain from the washing machine set up out the storm door and started laundry day. Later on, I will be opening up the drain pipe in the basement and working to clear it out some more. We’ve done the hot water/detergent flush from the kitchen sink a few times, but I can still hear from the laundry drain, what sounds like water backing up the pipe a bit. Not a problem at all for the kitchen sink, but a potential problem for wash cycle draining, as it drains so much faster than the kitchen sink, and is at least 6 feet closer to that first bottleneck. As good as that drain auger tip is for clearing the pipe, what we really need is a heavy duty bottle brush type pipe cleaner that can really scrape off the inside of the pipe. I’ve been looking and the closest I can find is up to 30 feet long (you can add sections to it) and can be attached to a drill, but it’s designed to clean dryer vents, so the brush is a LOT larger than the inner diameter of the pipe I am trying to clean out. The bristles may be flexible enough to bend and fit, though. I’ve found another version that includes a narrower bottle brush end for the lint trap that looks like it would fit much better, but the rod is only a maximum of 2′ long, and costs almost a much as the 30′ version.
*sigh*
I hate having to shop for this stuff online. I’ve never even seen anything like these at the hardware stores. Perhaps, however, I was just not in the right sections. Something to keep an eye out for.
Meanwhile, we’ll try to clear the pipe out as best we can, with the tools we’ve got.
It’ll be so nice to not have to run a house out the storm door window to do laundry again.
Judgement decided to follow me around while I was doing my morning rounds today. Which is fine, except that he kept running in front of my feet, then flinging himself into the snow in front of me. I finally had to pick him up and carry him, to avoid stepping on him.
He may be one of our most socialized cats, but he’s not THAT socialized! He did not like being carried!
I tried to get a picture of him, but he was moving around so much, it was really difficult. So I am so happy to have managed to get this shot!
This may well be the best picture I’ve ever managed to get of him! He doesn’t even look judgmental, for a change. 😄
We’ve had a light snowfall through the night that is supposed to continue, off and on, throughout the day. Or not. The forecast has changed, again, and now it’s saying the snow should stop within an hour or so. Of course, it’s also saying we have snow falling right now and, as I type this, I’m no longer seeing any. Our high of the day is supposed to get a few degrees above freezing. What that is actually expected to be seems to change every time I look at my weather apps, but we’re supposed to reach our high of the day somewhere around 6pm
Looking ahead in the 10 day forecast, we’re supposed to stay just above freezing for a few more days, then get a couple of days where the highs are below freezing – and then we’re supposed to get highs warmer than 10C/50F. What I’m really looking forward to is when the overnight lows get consistently above freezing temperatures! Well get a few nights above freezing throughout April, but it won’t be consistent until May, at the earliest.
The outside cats are going to really love the warmer nights!
It’s still snowing a bit as I write this. According to the weather radar, we are pretty much in the middle of the system that’s passing over us, but I’m just barely seeing snowflakes fluttering around at the moment. We are still under a snowfall warming, and they are now saying to expect a total of 15-25cm/6-10 inches of snowfall.
Unfortunately, the wind direction was blowing snow right into the kibble house, and the space between the kibble house, the cat house and the water bowl shelter was deep with snow.
On the plus side, there is no longer a big puddle of water on the bottom of the catio! I haven’t returned the food bowl into there, though, and have been leaving kibble on the replacement hammock we put in to replace the damaged one. I can reach that with my scoop of kibble without having to untie the door.
As you can see in the second photo of the above slide show, the cats are quite enjoying the catio!
In the last photo, taken after I shoveled around the shelters and cleared some paths, you can see how much snow accumulated on the shelter roofs. I didn’t go all out on the shoveling, though. We’re going to be warming up again and, even when the temperature is just a degree or two below freezing, things will start to melt.
The yard cats were certainly appreciating the cleared paths around their shelters – and the shelters themselves.
They also seem to really appreciate that I left those box nests under the shrine for them to use. Since one of the kibble bowls under there has disappeared, I started to put kibble inside the box nests as well as the one kibble bowl that’s left. If nothing else, it keeps the snow off the kibble! The cats seem to like eating out of them – and sitting on top of the boxes, too. These cat been built to be used inside the isolation shelter, they seem to be quite useful in other places, too!
There was no way to get them all in a photo, but I counted 13 cats inside the isolation shelter! Including Syndol, lounging on the hammock which, I’m happy to say, is no longer being constantly knocked loose from its hooks. Simply adding a cord joining the two hooks closest to the ramp to the second level seems to be enough to keep it from happening.
I didn’t even notice what The Grink was doing in the second picture above, until now. She’s got her face right up at that heat bulb!! (Yes, it is confirmed: The Grink is a lady.) I’m glad the new clamp lamp has a guard around the bulb, but she’s so tiny, she could easily push her face past it. I don’t think she will, but it’s a possibility.
Brussel seems to have picked up on my new routine for her. At first, when I came out to do the kibble and water, she would jump out of her nest and eat outside. I would wait until she was back with her babies, then use the long handled back scratcher to deliver wet cat food into the cat cave. Since she would be nursing her babies, I tried to drop it close to her face, so she could eat and nurse at the same time.
Lately, she hasn’t bother leaving the cat cave when I come out with the kibble. She growls at me when I take her food and water bowl out of the cage in the evening, then put it back, refilled, in the morning, but she doesn’t leave. She also grows when I deliver the wet cat food next to her, but she now immediately starts eating, without waiting for me to leave. This is encouraging, since one of my concerns is that she will take her kittens out completely, and who knows when – or if – we’d see them again. The mamas don’t bring their babies to the house until they’re ready for weaning and, by then, it’s a lot harder to socialize them.
I’m going to be on the lookout for another small cat cave like the one we brought over for Brussel. If we can fit another one in the cube where she originally went into labour, perhaps one of the other more feral mamas that went into heat really early will have her litter in it, instead of somewhere in the outer yard. We do have another cat cave in the house, but it’s far too big to fit into the cube. Plus, that one is in pretty constant use by the inside cats!
Looking ahead in the long term forecast, it seems this will be the last big snowfall for our area, and April is looking to have daytime highs above freezing consistently. In fact, we are supposed to start getting daytimes highs of 13C/55F and up by the middle of the month.
Of course, forecasts that far ahead are never a sure thing. What we’ll really be starting to look at as the season progresses is the overnight lows. Once the overnight lows are consistently 6C/43F or higher, the soil should be warm enough for cool weather crops. With my winter sowing, that means taking the mulch off the beds so the soil can warm up, and give the seeds we planted in the fall a chance to germinate. Those overnight temperatures, though, are unlikely to hit until the second half of May and into June.
With the current 10 day forecast, the snow we got should melt fairly slowly, which will be good for the garden beds. So far, it looks like we won’t be getting any serious spring flooding. Of course, that could change very quickly, if we find ourselves with an April blizzard. We shall see!
For now, I’m happy with the snow we got. We didn’t have a lot of snow over the winter, so this extra moisture will be good for the farmers’ fields, as well as our gardens.
We’ve got a much cooler day today – as I write this, it’s coming up on 1pm, and it’s still only 6C/39F, with a high of 13C/55F by about 6pm expected. I took full advantage of the cooler temperatures to get some things done! We’re supposed to start getting rain tomorrow, have more rain, off and on, over the next few days, so the more we can get done out there, the better!
The first job, of course, was to feed the yard cats. I counted 28 in total, I think. Knowing that we have kittens in the junk pile, I now put food out under the shrine, and even on the bench nearby. Which the Blue Jays appreciate… 🫤
Stinky, Hypotenose and Syndol were all pushing each other around, trying to get at pets!
I spotted Broccoli at the food bowls, so I interrupted my usual morning rounds and dashed to the garden shed.
I started taking out as many things as I could think to grab – garden stakes, hoses, netting, etc. I had to get under where the kittens were, so I lifted them all up in the self heating mat and set them on the ground as I worked. Once I got the stuff I thought I would need right away, I returned the tarp and the felted grow bags Broccoli has made her nest in, made sure it was flattened in such a way that no kittens would accidently roll off and get stuck somewhere, then carefully put them, still half snoozing, back in in their soft, fuzzy and warm mat.
By this time, Broccoli had come around the house and was watching me. When I was done and continued my rounds, she followed me around the garden. I’m hoping she will be okay with what I did, and not take her kittens away and hide them. By removing the stuff I did, I’m hoping we won’t need to open the door and disturb her and her babies for a while. I’ll still check on the, of course, but will try to do it only when I know Broccoli isn’t in there with them.
That done, I started doing garden related stuff. While rain may be on the way, we can’t count on it actually reaching us, so I did the watering. It looks like we finally have carrots sprouting, so I’ve moved the protective boards off of them. The German Butterball potatoes got the grass clipping mulch returned. I’m still putting the cover with the plastic on it over them, to keep the cats out. The garlic also got their mulch returned, now that they’re bigger, and watered.
After all the watering was done, I checked on the grapes. The false spirea growing nearby is trying to spread into them again, so I got some pruners to cut them away. Normally, I’d try to pull them up by the roots, but I can’t do that when they are right in with the grape vines.
Then I started clearing other spirea to clear more space around the grapes.
Before I knew it, I’d gone through the entire corner, clearing away dead false spirea, trimmed dead branches and last year’s flower husks, finding and clearing around a perennial flower that gets buried by the bushes every year, and really opening things up and cleaning them out.
The cats are very happy with this! They like to go under there. When they are in full leaf, it’s a shady spot they can hide in, and now it’s nice and clear of dead branches and twigs.
While the false spirea is leafing out, and the grapes are showing leaf buds, other things are further along. The “Mr. Honeyberry” haskap is in full bloom right now. I even saw a bumble bee among the flowers! The “Mrs. Honeyberry”, however, might have some leaves, not no flower buds yet. There’s no way proper cross pollination can happen, which means no berries.
*sigh*
The plum trees are blooming; they always bloom before they get their leaves. Quite a few tulips are showing flower buds, which is pretty awesome. The trees are also getting very green. So nice to see!
I look forward to getting back to work, when I get back from running errands!
The Re-Farmer 